


take me from the dark

by AzhaLambrin



Series: Hold Me In The Stars (Star Wars: Reylo series) [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Star Wars Setting, Dark Rey, Eventual Romance, F/M, Force Bond (Star Wars), Kylo Ren Angst, Kylo Ren Redemption, POV Rey (Star Wars), Post-Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Protective Kylo Ren, Rey Needs A Hug, Reylo - Freeform, Slow Burn, Slow Burn Rey/Kylo Ren, Unresolved Romantic Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-31
Updated: 2017-12-31
Packaged: 2019-02-24 15:51:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13217037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AzhaLambrin/pseuds/AzhaLambrin
Summary: Where Rey wakes up from the darkness, and Ben holds her through the night...





	take me from the dark

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kipnotize](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kipnotize/gifts).



> "Take me from the dark, from the dark  
> I ain't gonna make it myself.  
> Put your arms around me...  
> Let your love surround me.  
> I am lost. I am lost."
> 
> -Can You Hold Me, NF (feat. Britt Nicole)
> 
> I think it's a little bit late for me to thank kipnotize for reading Half Light but I hope this makes up for it!

Rey keeps turning in her cot, unable to shut her eyes.

It has been a long day for the newly turned Force-user and she was already having trouble sleeping. Images of a life she had closed herself to keep resurfacing and it annoyed her terribly.

Throwing the blanket off of her, Rey sits up and holds her head in her hands. Something was happening to her. She can’t understand it, this pounding inside her chest as if there was someone eager to get out. With her guard down, it was easy to fall off the Dark Side. The shell sleeps and the real Rey wakes.

 

 

 

Catching her breath, as if she had been underwater, she looks around the room. She was still on the Finalizer.

It was the minor slips like these that would help her get out, she knew. And she had to make use of every single one. Rushing to the door, she seeks Ben. Snoke made a mistake of revealing Kylo Ren’s redemption to her. She was certain now—more than ever—that he’s doing everything he could to pull her out of the darkness.

 _Ben!_ She calls out, looking wildly around the hall.

Something stirs and eventually wakes.

Rey sees his door, or what she assumes to be, and runs towards it. She has to get there in time before Snoke has a hold on her again. Before she knew it, the doors open, and Ben steps out with a frantic look in his eyes.

“Rey?”

She almost cried, a hopeful glee bursting in her heart. “Ben!”

But then she could feel the sharp tug, pulling her back. She tries to hold it off, to fight it. Rey screams inside, her vision dimming.

 _No, no,_ she whimpers, feeling the darkness drown her.

_Ben!_

Then he replies. “I’m here,” he says. “I’m right here, Rey.” His arms were around her, keeping her steady. “Focus on me. Don’t let it touch you.”

“It’s—taking over—”

“Focus,” Ben insisted. “Focus. You’re here. You’re with me, scavenger,” and he almost laughs.

Rey could feel it soften her, and lift up her spirits. Hearing him call her scavenger was the most natural thing in her world right now. If she was going to fight this, she needed more of that.

 _Your focus determines your reality,_ she remembers him say so she did just that.

“Are you still with me?” Ben asks quietly after moments of silence.

His hands remained on her arms, gripping it just right to make sure she doesn’t fall. But also, he held her as if he could pull her from the darkness with just his touch. He glanced down the hall to make sure no one was watching and when he looked back at Rey, she had her eyes open again. Ben was afraid to ask who she was, the shell or the core, but then warm hazel eyes gazed back at him and he knew.

He let out a sound between a sigh and a laugh, making Rey smile with tears in her eyes.

“I’m still with you,” she finally says, breathing hard with relief.

Before he could do it himself—and make it an odd gesture—Rey beat him to it. She wrapped her arms around his waist and held on tight, burying her face in his shirt, crying. But it was the good kind, if Ben ever saw one.

He ushered her inside before anyone could see them and let her sit down on his mattress. He kneeled in front of her, looking up into her eyes. She was still her.

“How do I keep you here now?” He wonders aloud, making her look at him. “How are you doing this?”

“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I think if my body is really tired, somehow, I’m able to tear through it.”

“Then you’re not really here?” Ben guessed, to which Rey nodded. “I tried connecting with you earlier.”

“I know,” she said, sighing. “I felt it, too.”

“Rey—” but Ben didn’t really know what else to say. He felt everything, her pain, her distress. It was too much. The agony reminded him of the years Snoke had ‘trained’ him; with abuse, and torture.

Knowing he can’t utter the words, Rey simply put her forehead against his and closed her eyes.

 _You made me feel strong_ , she tells him. _You didn’t make me feel alone._

“Thank you, Ben…”

He held her face with both hands, looking at her closed eyes. “Let me see them,” he begs. “I’ve gone too long without those eyes of yours.”

Still filled with tears, she opened them to him.

“You have to tell me everything—” he says now with urgency, “—everything that I need to know, everything you’re keeping. I can’t help you without it, Rey.”

When her gaze shifted away, he felt a skip in his heart from fear that he was losing her now. But then she stared back at him again, this time with a fierce fire burning in her eyes.

“It’s Snoke,” she says, quietly at first that he wasn’t sure he heard her right. “It’s Snoke, Ben,” she says again, louder now and with such hate Ben almost didn’t recognize her. “He’s _inside_ my head.” Her voice breaks.

Ben held her cold, shaking hands.

“I can’t shake him off.”

“You have to.”

“How did you do it?” Rey asks. “How did you block him out, that day you saved me? How did you fight him?”

He pursed his lips then and seemed to choose his words carefully.

“Ben?”

“I didn’t,” he suddenly admits.

“What are you saying?”

“I didn’t save you,” he claims. “You saved me.”

Rey looked at him for the longest time as he turned his eyes away from her. She still remembers that day clearly. He saved her, from Snoke, from the guards, from death.

Ben seems to hear this thought and finally explains. “You were fighting for me, from the inside. You wanted me to go into the light—and you have so much of that in you, Rey.”

 _I don’t really think I do anymore_ , she thinks which only makes Ben grip her hand tighter.

“I didn’t block Snoke out. I _couldn’t_. So, I embraced it, the darkness. And with every strength I had in me, I turned that against him.”

He had more to say but, the words were still stuck, and he didn’t consider this to be the best time to bring it up. Maybe later, when the world is at a balance and the Rey he’d come to know is back on her feet…

“But, Ben—” she didn’t know if she should ask but it seemed perilous if she didn’t. “—you didn’t turn that day. You did that on your own. I didn’t save you.”

“That’s also true, in some way,” he says. “Only you can truly save yourself.”

“Every day I spend in the darkness makes it harder and harder to resist,” Rey confesses, feeling herself sink.

“Then don’t,” Ben murmurs.

“What are you saying?”

“It’s always going to be there,” he tells her now. “As will the light.”

Rey hoped this was true. Above all things, the idea that there will always be the light gave her a sense of faith. With Ben here, that faith was embodied. This was her part, her role in this story; to make sure that there would always be a balance in this fight. And this reminds her of everyone else involve.

“The Resistance—” she begins but Ben already nodded, cutting her off.

“I’m taking care of it.”

Rey sighs in relief. “I may not have control of what’s happening to me. But I am aware. I _know_ what Snoke wants me to do and I’ll do everything I can to make sure that he doesn’t succeed, that I don’t do it for him. But if I’m not strong enough—” and she begs him now, making Ben say,

“You are—”

“But if I’m not,” she insists. “No matter what happens, don’t let me hurt anyone I care about.”

She could see the doubt in his eyes; the doubt that she wouldn’t be able to fight this, and this made her want to fight harder. Still, he nodded, a promise unspoken in his lips but made in his little gesture of squeezing her hand.

Rey couldn’t help but add, “That includes you, Ben,” and she means it.

He tried to hide it, that little smirk that turned up the corner of his mouth. Rey looked down at their hands, holding on to each other as if they would float away if they didn’t. Maybe she would. Maybe they only had minutes, or seconds, till the dark rises to take her again. But right now, she was here, bathing in this light they now both shared. He was holding her with no intent of letting go.

“Why do you want to go to Jabiim?” He asks suddenly.

Rey tried to remember what it was that was supposedly in Jabiim. She knew it was something important but, nothing came to mind. “I don’t really know,” she replies. “Whatever’s pulling there must be a way to stop this.”

“I’m hoping for it,” Ben says quietly.

Rey yawns, her eyes drooping.

“You’re tired.”

“A little bit,” she says, nodding.

“Get some rest.”

“I don’t want to go back to that,” she suddenly murmurs. “I know it’s pointless, delaying the inevitable. But I just…”

Then he said the most comforting words she could ever hear from another person, “I understand.” And it was true.

Ben was the only other person to completely comprehend what she was going through because he had been there first.

“Why don’t you stay here?” He suggests, a bit more quietly. “I’ll watch over.”

Watch over what, they both didn’t know. Rey was merely projecting after all. But it seemed the least inane gesture at the moment. Even in this fraction of reality, he would be there. She wouldn’t be alone. She wouldn’t be in the dark.

 _I can keep you safe,_ he thinks, loud enough for her to hear. _Even for just a while._

Rey begins to settle on the mattress, not bothering with the blankets, and makes herself into a tiny ball. Ben stays at the foot of the bed, doing as he promised. She almost smiles as she remembers the time he had taken her into his custody for interrogation. He had also stayed at a distance, watching her. How long ago was that?

“Seems like forever,” he replies, thinking about it too.

“Ben?”

He only looked at her, raising his brows slightly.

“Can you hold me?”

It wasn’t really a question of whether or not he can—given that he’s held her hand earlier—but it was a question of whether or not he should. But he didn’t really ponder on that much. He had already decided that he would, even before she asked.

Ben climbed up on the bed, settling next to her. She didn’t turn and simply waited for his arms to wrap around her frame. It was faint, but Rey could feel the warmth he was emitting. Soon, she turned to him and buried herself in his chest. The pounding in his heart matched hers, reminding her that they were both alive and that this was one of the things she had to live for.

After a while, she found peace in the rhythm of their breathing and fell asleep. She worried about tomorrow, what the darkness would bring, what Snoke would make her do. But she also looked forward to it because now she had more hope than anyone in the galaxy. She will strive on that and it will be the spark that will give light to the person she wants to be.

 

 

 


End file.
